Like Boris, new PM must back Ukraine
WHATEVER one may think of Boris Johnson, in Ukraine, from where I have just returned, he is a hero. I sincerely hope, as do my family and friends living there, that Britain will uphold the pledge he made in his resignation speech to stand with the Ukrainian people in their hour of need.
My wife Anna is Ukrainian, a native of Kharkiv, which has been under constant artillery attack since February 24, when Russia’s invasion began. Desperate to help, she contacted her friends in the city to see what we could do.
A childhood friend, Alexy Polonchuk, has set up a volunteer group called Vehicles for Ukrainian Guards, which provides cars to the army to move men and material behind the lines. We decided to drive our old car 2,000 miles to give it to them.
In Kharkiv we drove down familiar streets in which many buildings had been shelled, leaving blackened holes in the fabric of the city. Luckily, our block of flats was unscathed, apart from a few windows blown out by the shockwaves from missile strikes. That first night we only half-slept, new to the muffled crump of artillery shells, and next morning three soldiers arrived in a truck to collect our car.
One, Sergei, showed us pictures from the front lines: a bombed school, destroyed houses, a burnt-out shopping centre, then a blue-and-white church with a long line of black plastic body bags in front of it. ‘Bucha,’ he said quietly. The barbarity of the war on civilians laid bare.
The car, Sergei told us, would be used by an all-female medical team to evacuate wounded soldiers.
We talked solemnly about the war, the strain showing on his face, then he smiled. ‘Boris Johnson. UK. Very good. Thank you, thank you,’ he said. We hugged him and left.
Before setting out across Europe, we had put out an appeal for help with petrol money. The response was so overwhelming, it allowed us to fill the car with supplies for humanitarian organisations and kit for the army such as backpacks, solar-powered batteries and camping stoves. It showed us the British people are fully behind Boris’s pledge and the need to defend our Western values in the face of aggression. I hope the new incumbent of No 10 is equally determined.
YOU can donate to Vehicles for Ukrainian Guards via PayPal to Alexsnow73@gmail.com.